In the past, conventional gas light assemblies typically have included two or more mantels suspended from a gas manifold or burner head into which a combustible mixture of air and an illuminating gas, such as natural gas or propane, is fed. This combustible mixture is burned as it exits the mantels of the burner head to provide illumination. Typically, such gas light assemblies were constructed to remain continuously lit during both day and night. As a result, these gas light assemblies tended to waste a significant amount of gas by burning during daylight hours when the illumination of the gas light is not required, as well as significantly shortening the service life of the mantels and burner tips of the gas light assembly.
More recently, gas lamps or lighting assemblies have been provided with electrical control systems that can control the supply of gas to the burner head and mantels of the lamp based on ambient light conditions, and which include an automatic sparking device or ignitor for igniting the gas. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,830,606 discloses an electrical control system having an ignitor for each mantel of the lamp, with each ignitor being fired on a daily basis upon the opening of an electrically controlled gas control valve. Likewise, U.S. Pat. No. 5,478,232 discloses an ambient light controlled outdoor gas light having sensors for detecting light and dark ambient conditions and for detecting whether or not the lamp is already lit. A photoelectric cell alerts a comparator within a control circuit to a dark ambient condition. In response, the gas control valve is opened and the sparking device activated so as to create a spark to ignite the air-gas mixture.
A problem with such automatically controlled gas light systems generally has been that these systems have no mechanism for actively monitoring the several components of the system in addition to simply detecting a change between light and dark ambient light conditions. For example, such prior automatically controlled gas lights typically do not have a mechanism for monitoring battery life to determine if there is sufficient voltage in the battery of the system to activate the sparking device and to shut the system down prior to opening the gas control valve in this event. As a result, such systems tend to first open the gas valve and leave the gas valve open while attempting to create a spark even when the power in the battery is too low to generate a spark, for example when the battery needs replacing. This has led to a significant waste of gas, as well as creating a potentially dangerous situation by allowing gas to build up within the light fixture. Also, such prior gas light assemblies typically are designed for a specific burner head arrangement or primarily for new installations, and therefore cannot be used with a variety of different burner head arrangements or retrofit to old lamp assemblies, and are difficult to install.
Accordingly, it can be seen that a need exists for an improved gas light assembly that automatically monitors the surrounding ambient light conditions to ignite the gas light assembly in low light or dark conditions, and to turn off the gas light assembly during light conditions, for example, daylight, and which monitors the components of the system to hold the gas control valve of the gas light assembly in a closed position if a fault condition is detected in order to conserve gas and avoid a potentially dangerous build-up of gas in the light fixture, and to also provide such an improved gas light assembly which is reliable, safe, and easy to install with existing or new gas lights.